Dead Calm (film)
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| Dead Calm | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | Phillip Noyce |
| Produced by | Terry Hayes George Miller Doug Mitchell |
| Written by | Charles Williams (novel) Terry Hayes |
| Starring | Sam Neill Nicole Kidman Billy Zane |
| Music by | Graeme Revell |
| Editing by | Richard Francis-Bruce |
| Distributed by | Warner Bros. |
| Release date(s) | April 7, 1989 U.S. release |
| Running time | 96 min. |
| Language | English |
| IMDb profile | |
Dead Calm is a 1989 thriller film starring Sam Neill, Nicole Kidman and Billy Zane. It was based on the 1963 novel of the same name by Charles Williams, the film was directed by Australian filmmaker Phillip Noyce and filmed in the Great Barrier Reef.
Contents |
[edit] Main cast
| Actor | Role |
|---|---|
| Nicole Kidman | Rae Ingram |
| Sam Neill | John Ingram |
| Billy Zane | Hughie Warriner |
[edit] Plot summary
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The plot summary in this article or section is too long or detailed compared to the rest of the article. Please edit the article to focus on discussing the work rather than merely reiterating the plot. |
[edit] Meeting the Stranger
A troubled couple, Australian naval officer John Ingram (Neill) and his wife Rae (Kidman) take a break on their yacht in the Pacific after a tragic automobile accident in which their small son was killed while Rae was driving. The couple hope that this trip will help Rae cope with the loss. However, their holiday turns into a nightmare after they rescue an even more troubled stranger, Hughie Warriner (Zane), a man who claims to have lost his companions on another, now-disabled boat to food poisoning.
Suspicious of Hughie's story, John tries to convince the panicked Hughie to return with him to his sinking ship, so they can confirm the deaths and salvage anything of use. Hughie, however, refuses to go back.
In an attempt to find answers, John travels to the sinking ship while Hughie is resting. He tells his wife (who isn't convinced that Hughie is lying) to equip the shotgun and keep it with her. Instead of equipping the gun, Rae decides to let her husband go adventuring while she plays fetch with her dog. Upon his arrival on the ship, John discovers that Hughie's original story was untrue. He finds several bodies but realizes that the dead were murdered. Tape of a film reveals that Hughie was the cameraman for a low-budget production, during which he snapped and murdered the director and four women involved. Now knowing the truth, John tries to rush back to his yacht to warn Rae.
Meanwhile on the Ingram yacht, Rae sees John across the water yelling for her to get off the boat. The sleeping Hughie awakens, breaks out of the room in which he was locked, struggles with Rae before knocking her out, and turns on the boat's motor, abandoning John and traveling away with Rae onboard. John returns in his dinghy to the sinking ship to try to catch up and save Rae.
After a slight delay spent emptying the ship of water, John is able to start the ship's motor and start his gradual chase. Rae awakens to find Hughie piloting the ship and playing with the dog. She attempts (unsuccessfully) to convince him to go back for John, but he refuses because he told John not to board the ship in the first place. She then goes down below, collapsing on her bed and weeping. Later, she heads for the radio and tries to determine the distance between their yacht and John's location. She receives Morse code contact from John using the damaged radio on the sinking ship. Rae tells John that she will find a way to return for him. They decide that Rae should stop the yacht in order to buy some time for John to catch up, and she removes the keys so that the yacht cannot travel further. Hughie soon realizes this and attempts to retrieve the keys, which she tosses into the water. Unfortunately, her dog dives into the ocean and recovers them (thinking she was playing fetch). Frightened, Rae runs into the bathroom with the angry Hughie banging the bathroom door as hard as he can telling her to open it. Once Hughie calms down, Rae opens the door and smiles, leading Hughie to believe that she likes him.
Rae later contacts John to inform him that she has failed. John signals that the ship is going to sink within six hours, and Rae promises that she will get the yacht there by sunset. Before she can tell her husband that she loves him however, John's radio breaks down completely, and they are cut off. Rae begins to cry with helplessness.
[edit] Betrayed With a Kiss
A lustful Hughie sees Rae teary eyed and frightened and begins to soothe her. While Hughie is kissing her hands and embracing her, Rae realizes that he is seducing her and wants to have sex. She acquiesces by kissing him, while formulating a plan about what she'll do. A bit later after they have undressed, Rae grabs her robe and pretends to head for the bathroom, but actually heads up to the deck to assemble and load the gun. The dog shows up and begins to bark for attention. Suspicious, Hughie gets up from the floor to look for Rae. With the shotgun still unloaded, Rae quickly grabs a pack of cigarettes nearby and claims that they are for after they have sex.
To distract Hughie away from the shotgun, Rae kisses Hughie and leads him to the bedroom where she undresses again and lets Hughie caress her body. As Hughie gets on top of Rae, the dog enters the bedroom surprising Rae into thinking John had entered the room. Seeing a chance to buy more time to load the gun, Rae tells Hughie that she better put the dog back up on deck. However, Hughie manages to successfully get the dog to leave by ordering him to go away, leaving Rae unable to stall any further. Although Rae is at first uncomfortable, she wraps her arms around Hughie and the two have sex.
Back on the sinking ship, the mast falls over, covering the exit hatch and trapping John. He continues driving the boat until it no longer works, and as the room floods completely, he grabs a small tube and sticks it out of the hatch, allowing him to breathe. Suddenly, he sees fish inside the ship and realizes that there must be a hole. He finds it and breaks out of the ship. He sets the sinking ship on fire to signal for help.
Meanwhile Rae and Hughie are still in the bedroom. While Hughie is getting dressed in John's clothes, Rae sits on her bed feeling guilty for being an unfaithful wife by having sex with the man who left her husband stranded out at sea. With time running out, however, she focuses on rescuing John by continuing to play the part of "Hughie's lover". When Hughie leaves for the bathroom, Rae fixes a drink, slips in some of her sleeping medicine, and pretends to drink it as he returns. She then offers it to Hughie, telling him to fix her another one while she dresses.
[edit] Rae's Plan
Back on deck, Rae finishes loading the gun and hides it when she hears Hughie coming. Hughie is suspicious again until Rae buys time by saying that he should ready the yacht for a coming storm. When Hughie returns, he finds her with the gun and fights to get it away from her. The fight wears down Rae, who drops the gun and hides, but Hughie is feeling the effects of the sedative. He uses up the ammunition, which allows Rae to locate John's spear gun and lock herself in the bedroom. When she opens the door in the belief that she has managed to shoot Hughie through it, he nearly succeeds in strangling her but passes out. Rae ties him up and begins single-handedly steering the boat back to John.
Hughie cuts himself loose with a broken mirror piece, but Rae knocks him out with the spear gun. She later releases a rescue raft from the yacht, pushes Hughie's body into it, and watches him float away. Rae later sights the now-blazing shipwreck in the distance and eventually finds John in a raft next to the signal fire he has set. Holding out her hand, she pulls him from the raft as the yacht speeds by.
Rae and John find the rescue raft, though Hughie is no longer on it. (Rae sinks it with a flare gun, leaving John to wonder what happened while he was gone.) The next day, after Rae returns to the yacht from a swim and John is preparing a meal, Hughie suddenly appears behind her and attempts to strangle her. John returns, sees the struggle, and grabs a flare gun that he fires into Hughie's mouth. Hughie's head flares up as he falls off of the ship. Rae and John run to one another and together stare at Hughie's body as it floats away in the ocean.
[edit] Tagline
- A Voyage Into Fear.
- High Seas. Deep Terror.
- Try To Stay Calm.
- In the middle of nowhere there is nowhere to hide.
[edit] External links
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